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Introduction to Linux - A Hands on Guide

This guide was created as an overview of the Linux Operating System, geared toward new users as an exploration tour and getting started guide, with exercises at the end of each chapter.
For more advanced trainees it can be a desktop reference, and a collection of the base knowledge needed to proceed with system and network administration. This book contains many real life examples derived from the author's experience as a Linux system and network administrator, trainer and consultant. They hope these examples will help you to get a better understanding of the Linux system and that you feel encouraged to try out things on your own.

Gentoo. Theres only a few words to really actually describe it. The Best. I have seen and went through many distros over the past years and none have really been able to satisfy me the way Gentoo has done. I have tried Mandrake (too crappy), Slackware(hardly ever a DVD version and not enough customization to it), Suse (slow after awhile), then I decided to use Gentoo for all my needs. Gentoo is the best distro to you cause IMHO. You have full control over the installation, the packages, the updates, and everything. Its for the the people who basically need the best for their system. It's a source based distro where as everything is installed based on source. Alot of apps don't take long to compile while others do. But when its done compiling you will be happy it took that long. For example I can install a certain application and want this feature but not that feature. I can do so. You can't do that really on any other distro, Windows I know for sure, OSX. If you have never done an install of Gentoo before it can seem quite alot of work which at first it took me 2 hours to do it but then now it only takes like 30 minutes. Then I just install the base kde or base gnome without the clutter of unness. apps that come with it and bam you have a complete system for your enjoyment. I recommand this even for n00bs cause it will teah you Linux really well trust me. Cause it has teached me alot of things.

It is indeed a good distro. Not too hard to use if you already have some experience. Well documented so you can search for help and as always you will always find people to help you. A lot of work to install for the first time but it is very easy to learn. I say it is one of the best distros I have ever used. Second only to Debian but Debian takes too long to make new stuff available.

Fast, stable, slim, good document available on the internet, finding and instlling software is so easy with emerge

Cons:

Hard to install, Installion take too long.

I have been loyal to FC for over years and I have deicded to try another one.
I have heard that gentoo and slack is very good and I have choose gentoo since I require only 1 CD for the installer.
Difficulties arrive even at the install step.
I didn't know that gentoo would download and compile all the soft so I choose too many software to install and the install took me 6 hours to finish 100/337 package.
I cancel the installion, go to gentoo and other places to ask for a tip that can reduce the installion time.
I follow the simple rule "Use stage 3, select GRP" and I have gentoo up, running after 5 hours. It is too long, however it is finish.
The first glimpse at gentoo give me an impression that it run so much faster than FC.
How ever there is two bad things:
My screen is stuck in 640x480.
Alsa hasn't been installed yet.
The solution is simple, but it took me 2 weeks to find out: I will have to recompile the kernel.
I had compiled kernel twice, the first time is to enable the graphic card driver, and the second is for alsa (I forgot to deal wit alsa in the first recompile).

Now, after all the hassle, I am happy with gentoo.
I still keep FC4 in my hard disk just in case.
But gentoo perform so well that I am wonder should I upgrade FC4 to FC5

I installed Gentoo over a year ago, and just recently decided to try the new graphical installer after I had hard drive problems. I did have a problem reformating the drive (not sure why, so I booted into knoppix and used QTParted). Things went pretty well after that and I was up and running in Gnome within a short time, but being a KDE guy I started installing KDE, OpenOffice, and all the other things I wanted, which did take quite a while (a couple of days, but I could still use the system during this time, so it was no big deal). The thing I think people miss about Gentoo and how long it takes in install software is that Gentoo doesn't ever require you to upgrade your entire "version". Instead of deciding to do a "dist-upgrade" or something like that to get the newest version of every program you are spreading that time out over the entire year. Occasionally there are problems, but I have yet to actually "lose everything" from an upgraded package, the way I have with other distros. The main drawback I have seen is the lack of "automatic" features that are common now in distros like Mandriva (automounting USB drives, etc). I am still working on getting that set up on my Gentoo system, but it does not seem too easy to do (nothing has worked yet). I am still very happy with it, even with small things like that being more difficult than other distros.

Gentoo is a fantastic distro. Portage (The app that acts like a package manager) makes customizing and maintaining software a breeze! I would recommend this distro highly to anyone that is seriously interested in learning more about configuring a Linux system. I myself was still a pretty big newb, but I have learned loads. The only downside to this distro vs. a binary based distro is (of course) compile times. Older machines take fricken forever to compile big applications =D

I have been using Linux for about 2 years and recently got a new computer. I used SuSE on my old computer (Pentium 4-M laptop) for those 2 years and I liked that, but SuSE didn't seem to run as well as I thought it should on my new machine. I tried a few other distributions and was not that impressed with their 64-bit versions. A friend that was a longtime Gentoo user urged me to use Gentoo, so I thought, what the heck, I'll try it.

My old laptop, hooked to a working Internet connection, opened to the Gentoo Handbook and the Gentoo documentation site.

I used a Stage 3 install and used the stage from the CD to speed the install. The installation of the base system went very smoothly with the Gentoo Handbook on the other computer being an absolute necessity and godsend in getting everything to work perfectly the first time. One thing that I did and I HIGHLY recommend is writing down the following pieces of information:

1. Output of lspci so that you can get all of your devices compiled into the kernel (do this before you chroot.)
2. List of partitions, FS types, and /dev/ names. You need to know where /boot is to make a working grub.conf and the rest is so that you can tell the OS to mount the disks when it starts (/etc/fstab.)
3. Output of lsmod, also to ensure the kernel has the modules you need (also do this before you chroot.)
4. Exact name of your kernel image and initramfs, if you use genkernel. This is needed in the grub.conf.
5. If you don't use a wired Ethernet connector with DHCP, network keys, IP addresses, nameservers, etc for the network configuration file.

Installation of X and my NVIDIA drivers went smoothly and quickly. I installed ccache to speed up the compile and it has a very positive effect on compile times, particularly if you need to recompile a package with a new USE flag. It took about 70 minutes to download the files and compile them all. Installing KDE was a bit trickier as I wanted KDE 3.5 and only KDE 3.4.3 was in stable. KDE 3.5 is stable in my opinion and it ships with a LOT of other distributions. I used a little script to unmask only the KDE packages so that I could install KDE 3.5 without letting a bunch of other possibly unstable non-KDE apps in too. KDE takes a while to install- it took me a few hours to do. My last task was to get both monitors to work in TwinView mode. I did it with only minimal goofing around due to the helpful guide on the NVIDIA website. The two monitors are not the same resolution, but they work very well in dual-head mode since I added the "xinerama" USE flag in my /etc/make.conf.

So it took me roughly a full day to install a full KDE installation with Gentoo. I now have a *very* fast and seemingly very stable Linux desktop customized exactly how I want it. Portage is probably the best package manager I have used as it is very powerful and makes updating packages very easy so that you have the latest ones at all times- no waiting for the next release for a newer kernel, etc. I am wishing that I had tried Gentoo before as its reputation for being difficult is a little exaggerated and had scared me off from trying it before. It's certainly not a distribution suited for a Linux novice, but somebody with a moderate amount of knowledge and experience with Linux- any Linux- should be able to do this with few to no problems. It is certainly worth it!

:twocents: Absolutely the best distro besides LFS for creating ultra-optimized and customized setups.

Gentoo linux allows you to compile all system programs and libraries on your system or via distcc for a highly optimized setup. Also, through the use of USE flags, it allows you to specify exactly what you need for your system.

The emerge package management system allows for seemless installs and for automatic dependency handling. It even allows you to clean out unused libraries and allows for installing mutually dependend software easily. It has all the benifits of compiling the software yourself and all the benefits of a package manager.

The only downside is that on fast hardware installs can take around 12 hours and on slow hardware installs can take days because all packages are compiled from source.

I've done lots of various installs of gentoo over the last couple of years, I've also tried a number of distros. I have 3 main needs for an os. My home server, my home desktop, and my laptop that I use at home but also for work.

As a server OS.
Install on the server was perfect nice and easy, once the kernel was compiled, the network was setup, I could just ssh into the box and install any addtional software remotly. which is handy as the box is headless :)

As a desktop OS.
The only thing in the desktop that was not configured was my wireless nic. I've had 2 at various stages, a prism54 and a atheros (madwifi). Neither could be configured by the gentoo liveCD. It had a prism driver but no firmware. It did not have a madwifi driver at all. If the ubuntu guys can get this right I don't see why the gentoo guys can't so every time I want to install gentoo on the desktop i've to get an ubuntu cd.
Another issue was after installing the stage 3 and setting use flags the "emerge --newuse --deep world" would fail after about 3 packages. I tried everything with no joy, then after a sync it suddenly worked for another 5 packages. Then it failed again, Then after another 5 days and another sync it worked again. This is not acceptable, I know it takes a while to compile but a 2-5 day wait before you can even start to compile is a disaster. I had to move the machine to use the onboard nic, but the nforce-network driver that ships with the install cd performs really bad and delayed the install even more. Once installed though its been perfect in every way.

As a laptop os.
I love this disto, but getting it on a machine which does not have a ATAPI CD rom is an exercise in hair pulling. Boots from the external usb cdrom, after booting cant find the cd! If you use the failsafe command line and try load some modules you'll find there is not scsi cd module on the disk. if you load the usb-storage driver and run mknod to make a cd device, the the installer still will refuse to install from /dev/sr0 which is the correct device.
To put this in perspective my 5 year old copy of RH9 can even boot and install from a usb cd without complaining once. To resolve this I had to install FC5 on the machine, and do the gentoo install from inside Fedora.

I love this disto but can only give it a 7.

The install cd needs to support more hardware. None of this stuff is strange and is supported well by other distros. (usb cdroms, scsi cdrom, madwifi wireless and intel wireless)

I'd rather have this stuff than a graphical installer that still is no use as I either never get there (usb cd) or I can't use it to install the os (slow nforce nic drive, or no wireless driver)

Just wanted to add to the previous post, you don't need to use the gentoo cd to install you can use any livecd and follow the instructions given on the gentoo homepage. So it's not that a big problem if the gentoo install cd doesn't suport boot from usb-cdroms

Fantastic distro! I tried redhat which I found far too bulky and slow, slackware which I love but scares me anytime I need to do a major update and I hate their packet manager(s) and I found debian do be mesy and far too elietist. Gentoo is very fast, the documentation is amazing and the people do give a hand, unlike another distro I know.

With the USE flag, every app work as you want, and for audio/video playback, you can get every format playing on your box with no effort.

The only thing I didn't like is that some packages takes a long time to go out. For exemple, firefox 1.5 was out for a couple of months, and the latest package was still firefox 1.0.5. Ho, and when you're away from home and have a crappy Internet connection (or not at all), you're fucked...

I don't know if this was right, but I have to say it out since I cannot report it to moderator.
I want to give some words to the 2 guys who had rate gentoo a 0:
You rate it 0 without state out its cons. This is not a good way to behave.
You was unable to find the link to download gentoo is absolutely not a reason to rate it 0. You haven't try it yes how can I rate it a 0??

If there was a moderator reading that, I hope he will remove the 2 fake reviews as well as mine.

long compile times, easy to break if you don't know what you're doing, installation very long

I have tried Gentoo for a few weeks and here is my review

Pros: Portage is really great for keeping your system up to date and to download programs, makes maintenance really easy. Through various txt files configuration is limitless, and the system is fast.

Unfortunately these cons are really noteworthy if you are seriously considering this distro

Cons: First off the installation is long, VERY long. On slower machines the installation can take up to a day and decent machines is AT LEAST 5 hours. This is a very big setback. Another major problem with gentoo and any other source based distro are the compile times. Compile times for big name programs like openoffice, gnome, KDE take a VERY long time to compile from source, ranging from several hours to at least a day or two. Another problem is that while the handbooks and forums make this distro very newb friendly, it is too easy to break the distro. It could be as simple as making a typo during a manual installation to having ridiculous compile options. Unfortunately it is way too easy for newbies to break their 5+ hour hardwork with the simple addition of an extra flag to your make.conf file.

Ultimately it is up to you to decide whether you try this distro out or not. Be forewarned that you will need to devote a lot of time and energy, probably more then you would need for other distros.

What else can I say other than I learned a lot from using this distribution.

I learned how to build my own kernel, how to use a compiler from the command line, how to make a script executable...

It's also really fast. I saw about a 10% - 15% performance increase over Kubuntu. It is very stable as well. I've only had an occasional failed boot due to a kernel panic because of the whacky nature of my laptop, otherwise the thing is solid as a rock. I've only ever seen Debian work more stably.

Compiling everything from sources can be a pain at times. However, there are tools to help. distcc is one thing that can help that.

The Gentoo community is superb. There are a lot of people there that know what they're doing and are very responsive when you have a problem. I've never seen any immaturity or hostility exhibited on any of their mailing lists (esp. after being almost laughed out of the Debian AMD64 list - not fun).

Very customizable distro to say the least. More powerful package manager than most (once you start using it it's really powerful).

Works well on my laptop (big big positive), worked perfectly on my desktop. Planning on using it on my server.

I wouldn't suggest this to a total and complete newbie, but to someone who has about 4 - 8 months of hard Linux experience this is a marvelous way to learn more.

Very survivable distro as well I might add. I've accidentally done a few dumb things to it and it's always come back just as strong and stable as ever after I've taught myself how to fix what I broke.

Love it to death. One of the best decisions in my life installing it. Haven't had to reinstall it once. The best distro for me. Try it - you might find that you agree with me. (you might not, but I'm not going to be so presumptuous as to tell you what you do and do not like.)

Portage is nice to keep system up to date, decent community, good documentation

Cons:

Compile and installation take a very long time, installation can be daunting and confusing to newbies, performance increase is questionable

Here is my review of Gentoo Linux

Installation

I downloaded the livecd from the Gentoo homepage. Once I put the cd in it whisked me away to a fully functioning gnome desktop. On the screen there are two ways to install gentoo, one is the text based install and the other is the graphical install. I chose the graphical install. From there I am greeted with a message recommending me to do the manual install a couple of times. Next is to get the network up and running. The livecd didn't seem to like my laptop's ipw2200 wireless card. So I used the standard ethernet connection which it detected no problem. Next up is partitions, I opted for using the whole hard drive for the install so I wiped the current partitions and clicked on recommended setup. Next it asked me how I would be getting my portage snapshot and what stage tarball to use. I just opted to use the ones provided in the livecd to save time. Then I was given a list of choices for programs, desktop environments, so on and so forth. I made my choices then asked what USE flags I would want. I made my choices and proceeded onward. Next I was asked what I wanted as far as what login manager to use, keyboard layout, mouse layout, and other little things. A lot of configuring for an installation, I can see a lot of newbies getting confused up to this point. Finally the actual installation begins. I was warned ahead of time that the process is long so I started the installation at 8am and went to class until 4:30. By the time I got back home the installation just finished. I was glad I had other things to do instead of sitting there and waiting for the installation to finish. Made some final configurations then rebooted the system.

Post-Installation

Upon reboot I was greeted with my gnome desktop. I then proceeded to update portage, get my ipw2200 wireless card working, and other configurations that needed to get done. Compiling some of these programs from source took a very long time. Some as long as 3 hours while others were 10-20 minutes.

Pros

Portage is a very nifty tool to keep your system up to date, the system ran as fast as my Slackware configuration did. The documentation is very thorough and informative, which is a plus. The community is also pretty helpful

Cons

The installation was very long, and I hate to see how long in much older systems. Another problem with the installation is that it asked a lot of questions that most users aren't really asked in an installation. This can be confusing and daunting to new comers. The compile times are also incredibly long, it took 3 hours to compile openoffice.org, and I heard testimonies that it has taken several days to compile certain programs. There may be precompiled binaries and ways to save you time in compilation but this still doesn't efficiently resolve the issue.

Conclusion
The main question is Was the system faster after being compiled from source? This question is kind of hard to answer. In some instances the system did seem slightly faster compared to a similarly configured Slackware system I had on my laptop. Other instances showed no noticeable increase in performance. Overall the performance increase is marginal at best from what I have experienced. This distro has a lot of perks such as portage to keep your system up to date but the long compile times and long installation times are a really big setback for people wanted to use gentoo on older systems. My final thoughts are try the system and see if its what you are looking for but be prepared to spend a lot of time configuring and compiling the system, proabably more time then you would with other distros.